A Complete Idiot's Guide To Writing A Hunger Games Fanfiction
by thecatclouder
Summary: Welcome to the HG story archives. This is a guide/story on how to write a cliché filled fanfiction which has been done a million times before, so much so that new clichés had to be invented for it. Don't worry, you'll get a lot of reviews. Providing you aren't too original. After all, there are so many stories of the same topic. They must be doing something right... right?
1. Introduction

**A Complete Idiot's ****Guide To Writing A Hunger Games Fanfiction**

**Disclaimer: The original concept of the Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins. The inspiration for this fic belongs to many fanfiction writers who have repeated the same clichés over and over, so I cannot take credit for that either.**

**However, putting it into the following sentences and paragraphs is all me. XD**

**Note To Mods: **This story is a repost of the original version which was deleted. I still have no idea why, as this is not a non-story. If you had let me get past the introduction, you would have found that there will be one-shots interspersed within here as parodying demonstrations. If you would like to find stories to delete, please search for the dozens which are completely in bold, or type the word 'list' into story search. This was deleted after one chapter. There are some lists which have dozens of chapters with absolutely no story and it's been explicitly stated in the rules that you cannot do lists. This story was deleted after one chapter, and there was nothing saying that you could not do guide stories. I reread the guidelines, and I did not even see the word 'guide' mentioned in things you couldn't do. If you want to make a big deal about this a second time, please message me first instead of just deleting it. 

Also thank you for the reviews I received before. Thank you Guest, RueThisDay, squekythe2nd, and CrazyFanGirl; and all of you who favourited or followed it. There is a fair amount more interest in this story than my other stories, so I might not be able to message everybody to tell you that it has been deleted then reposted, so I hope you find the story again. :)

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**Introduction:**

Hello, strange person. I see you have come across this fanfiction site and want to read some top quality storytelling. Good luck. This is not the article to help you find stories, but one to tell you how to write run-of-the-mill stories which get a lot of reviews.

Clearly, because so many people have done it this way, it is obviously the best way. There are several different ways of doing so. The way which gets the most reviews starts with a quality character (Finnick, Katniss, etc.), made OOC out of all proportion, then pushed together in some sort of romance which does not work. Literally, the higher your cliché counter goes the better off you are. Also, dream up some completely ridiculous scenarios which cannot possibly work inside the parameters of the original story it is based on, or sometimes not even in the laws of physics or medicine. Bye bye gravity, you can come back into existence once the main character is safe.

For those of you who do not know, OOC means 'out of character'. If you are doing this, it is realistically an OC (own/other character), but in order to keep the reviews you must keep the names. Don't worry, if that does not work there are plenty of characters, such as Brutus or Bristel (guess who that is without looking at Hunger Games wiki or the book, I dare you) who do not have many lines so nobody will know whether they are OOC. All they are working off is preconceptions of the characters, so if they say it is OOC you can ignore them. Teleport those random characters into District X/the Capitol for some reason, and then you can add them to your list of characters and make the story more popular.

There are many different types of stories out there. Remember, doing something totally original does not work. People want to read stories they have read about a thousand times before from a slightly different perspective. In the following chapters I will take you through a guide of writing completely different clichés, with examples of the general guidelines of such a story. I will not be naming writers, but if you have done some of the following stories the chances are you are guilty of some of the points.

There is only one thing more thing I really have to get out of the way in this introduction. The disclaimer. Usually, you can just say the Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins and leave it at that, but many people aren't that boring. Add in something like how you wished you did, or even pretend you do and add another note afterwards saying you don't. It all works. Don't worry, tons of people do it. They know you are just some fanfiction writer. But write a disclaimer, seriously, just to be safe. I've seen some people forget them completely.

Now that's not a very funny sentence to end on. So let's get your writing mind-set going. Listen to some music and only reveal which track the reader was meant to be listening to at the end of each chapter. Giggle like a crazy idiot as you think of cheesy crap. And most of all, forget that all the things you have written aren't original, as you have to be better than those almost identical cliché stories everybody has thought of. Damn. You thought you were the only one, didn't you...?

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**Secondary disclaimer: I take no responsibility for people who do end up getting sued, for whatever reason, because my parody condoned ridiculous disclaimers. **


	2. Random OC Games - 74th HG Ripoffs

**Hi. I know I already republished this story today, but I know there who read it before and were nice enough to re-review and I thought I'd give you the other chapter I'd typed up just before I noticed my story no longer existed. :) **

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**Random OC Games - 74th Hunger Games Ripoff**

Don't feel like ripping off named characters totally? Well done, now you will delve deep into the world of OCs. Also included within this large category are 74th Hunger Games rip-offs and SYOTs, or as they are sometimes known: stories with many confusing characters because the writer (and if you choose to do so, you) does not feel like coming up with characters by themselves. The subcategory of SYOTs will be covered in the next chapter.

The first step to creating a random OC games is to come up with a random OC. Got it yet? No. That's alright, because you don't need much back story. Just dump-start them at the Reaping and everything will be fine. Alternatively, give them a Katniss-esque back story where they can hunt and do whatever whether they would be logically able to or not. Family? Just give them a sister, or a brother, or whatever you feel like. After the saying goodbye scene they shall not be mentioned again, or if they are it will only be done briefly.

Friends? See family. You don't have to evolve them at all, just give them a name and a few lines of speech.

Random note 1: Names. There are clearly only several Panemy names available. Choose the most ridiculous one you can come up with for the district. Names like Sparkle for District 1, Brutus II/Bruta (yes, those exist) for District 2, Pita and Rye for District 9 and any a flower/plant name for any non-urban non-Career district would be fine. If you find anything more ridiculous, use those as well. If you are completely short, open a dictionary on a random page and make a name out of the first random word you see.

As soon as you have a slight story behind your main character, write the Reaping. Your main character, occasionally, is incredibly skilled and is better than all other people even though there is no logical reason for this. This is known as being a Mary-Sue or Gary-Stu, and while people sometimes complain about that most of the time it's alright as long as you give them one weakness. Sometimes this does not even have to be a proper weakness. For further details on doing so, please consult Stephanie Meyer's Twilight franchise.

So give them one weakness. It can't be crippling or anything like that, and if you want drama they have to face that later, but not so much so that they use. In the cases where there is only one main character, it is obvious from this point that they are going to win so you are kidding nobody. However, add pointless drama which makes people review in such a way that you pretend the character isn't going to make it.

This style is also similar to writing the Hunger Games of previous Victors, mostly those named ones mentioned in the Quarter Quells (including Haymitch's one). Disregard that thought for now, as it will be covered in a later chapter.

Now that you have your character who is clearly going to win, two sentences of backstory, and two sentences of family and friends, it is time to go to the Capitol. Of course, they need mentors. While the sane creative way of doing it is also coming up with your own mentors, as in districts like 1, 2 or 4 there are many Victors, that is not the right way. Clearly, unless you have chosen a district with no named Victors, you will choose the two which Suzanne Collins named in the 3rd Quarter Quell. Who cares if that is slightly inaccurate with the years won. Nobody will really notice.

Also, their lines shall be almost exactly identical to those Haymitch had when he was mentoring Katniss, descriptions and all. While there aren't that many ways to tell people what to do in the Capitol, try and do it as close to the original as possible without copying word for word. Or, if you are very daring, copy it word for word. Just make sure that you have written a disclaimer as outlined in the introduction.

Next, you shall write some description of the Capitol which is basically a rip-off from the original book. Ditto that for the prep team. Give them some weird names, or just leave them unnamed. By the time we get to the strong boy who is good a sword fighting from District 2, the small girl who is good at knives from 2, the sly looking girl from 5 and the muscular large guy from 11 nobody cares about the prep team anymore.

This is another part of an example where your story is basically a rip-off of the 74th Hunger Games. If at that point you think it is too subtle, include a part where your sixteen year old heroine volunteers for her twelve year old blonde sister. That should work. Also, she's sort of good with a bow, or a knife, or foraging. Yep, all those work. Remember to make it really obvious, as there is also another twelve year old (frequently from 11, but can be from equivalent districts such as 10 or 9) who reminds your main character of her sister so they ally. Also, the tracker-jacker scene. Redo this with some sort of other newly invented mutt with a poor name which has the same affect.

But don't worry. Even then you may think that nobody will notice. Therefore you must include an author's note admitting it, once again, just in case people hadn't noticed. Then label it the 73rd Hunger Games or something, as if the exact same thing would happen two years in a row.

Moving on. You have passed through the tribute parade where you character clearly stood out even if they had no discernable skills (if this is the case, don't worry, you don't have a Mary-Sue, simply an irrationally lucky Victor later) and now they go up to their floor. Bla bla bla. Ignore that. Just skip straight to training, unless you want to add in a romance.

What am I saying? Of course you want to add in a romance. Or at least deep friendship between district partners. Go far off topic with forced awkward conversation, and do the bare minimum description for training, because, you know, that would involve actually writing something decent and you want to get to the Games already. Skip over the interview training day completely, but make sure that your main character's score reflects whichever strategy they were going for instead of the actual skill level of what they did in the training room.

Forget that. Don't write the scoring sessions at all, so you don't have to come up with anything and just give them their scores. Give them great scores. Well done, they are now in the game. Write some interview with an OOC Caesar Flickerman, even if it's the second Hunger Games and he wasn't alive then, and get on the way. Warning, the interview might be awkward, but find enough people to tell about it and you will still get about ten positive reviews per chapter because people are usually nice online apart from a few exceptions. Even if they're not nice, it does not matter. People look for the amount of reviews and not the quality of reviews, unless you only have about one or two.

Next, the Games. You've got a forest, of course. Original arenas can wait. Of course it's a forest. Now go through days of hiding and… no wait, it cuts off here. We fanfiction writers are surely an unreliable bunch, so most fanfictions do not get past the first day of the actual Hunger Games. And you thought you wanted to get to this point quickly…?

If you want to beat that trend, keep writing things which are obviously based on the 74th Hunger Games. Make your main character ally with that twelve year old, for example. Dodging Careers, killing Careers, hiding in trees. You know, all of the things Katniss did. Just copy that and mix the order up a bit.

Finally, when you get to the final six or so, have a feast. The majority of fanfiction writers forget all about this, so it is alright if you skip it. If there is a feast, write it distinctly similar to that of the 74th Annual Hunger Games, with the packs containing something they need instead of… you know… food.

Then, finally, your tribute will find his/her (usually her) district partner. This may be before this point, but he will die and your main character will hold his hand exactly like was done with the twelve year old.

The finale, of course, will be between that of the District 2 male and your main character. Your main character wins! What a shock. They are crowned Victor, maybe they watch the replays, and maybe there is a Victory Tour. Ah yes, perfect. That's that completed then.

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Example: Now, let's put it all together. For easy identification comments on how to do the following are written in bold brackets. Here is a shortened example for the case of many fanfictions in order to fit neatly into the end of this chapter, however if you do not feel like writing this also works. What am I saying? Of course you don't feel like writing exponential amounts before the Games. Just separate your versions of the following into different chapters, focusing more on your chosen parts as preferred.

When I say as preferable, you can choose between the romance and the romance. After all, you cannot make it too original. Your readership will shrink to the size of a prune.

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Disclaimer: I own the Hunger Games. Friend: No you don't. Me: Fine, I don't. **(one of these disclaimers would suffice)**

Chapter 1

Hello, I am **(insert Mary-Sue name)** Kitty McClouderly. I live in District 12, and we are all totally poor. I am sixteen and I have a twelve year old sister. This is a horrible day, because it is the Reaping. Effie Trinket comes up to the stage.

"Welcome, welcome, and may the odds be ever in your favour!" Effie trills. "This is the 5th Annual Hunger Games, because somehow I am alive already **(state the occasional thing the characters would not logically know)**. The female tribute… Katty McClouderly!"

"No…no… not Katty. I volunteer!" I shriek. I run to stage, tell my name with my totally brilliant voice. "I'm Kitty McClouderly. I am totally fantastic but doomed. I shalll be you're **(note spelling mistakes – make these frequent)** main character."

Nobody cheers, because it is District 12 and nobody cheers **(pointless sentence with says the same thing twice)**. Next, the Peacekeepers escort me to a room in the Justice Building, where people will say goodbye to me.

First in is my sister, Katty.

"I love you so much. I know you are going to win," Katty said **(change of tense – also do this frequently). **"I know you can win." My parents are also there.

Next, my friend comes in. **(cut off here for no particular reason)**

**[total review count: approx. 4]**

Chapter 2

The peace keepers **(spelled differently to first time) **come and take me to the train. My district patrner is also there. He's called **(add some random name which somehow relates to coal) **Mine. Everything looks amazing, greater than my very poor district. **(use questionable grammar)**

"I'm Haymitch, your mentor," the Victor of the 50th Hunger Games slurred. He was a drunk. Too bad District 12 hasn't won in four years. How can I compete against those odds? **(changing details throughout the story). **

We watch the tributes from the other districts. The tributes are strong, stronger than me because I got know skills from hunting.

**[total review count: approx. 7]**

Chapter 3

We went to the tribute parade. My District partner Canary **(see that, once again, the details have changed) **and I are dressed as coal, which makes us very doomed. I cried, because the boy from 2 insisted on picking me off as a target. **(use reasoning that makes no sense, as your tribute appears unskilled)**

Then we walk upstairs. Everything is amazing. I am scared because I have to go to a fight to the death. Canary comes to see me.

"I really like you." **(weird dialogue where you cannot figure out who says what)**

"I'm scared."

"You are going to have to fight."

"But they are all so much stronger." **(also it makes little logical sense)**

"You are strong to."

Then we kiss. It is brilliant. **(unromantic undescribed hints of romance)**

**[total review count: approx. 12]**

Chapter 4

I learn so much during training. I could always learn things quickly **(mentions things at this late stage which logically would have been discovered and mentioned a long time ago). **

I learn how to start fires and build shelters and climb and use weapons. I do very well in my private training session. I get a score of 10, which is brilliant. **(do not describe how she manages to do that unlikely event). **

Also, Canary and I are getting more in luv. But we are going to a fight to death together. What can I do?

Then I have interview training. I am totally awesome at speaking too people. **(random illogical time skipping)**

"Next up, from District 12, its Kitty McClouderly!" Cesar Flikermann **(misspelling of canon character names) **annonced**. **"Thee Capitol is awesome. Don't you agree?"

"Yes. It's brilliant. I'm great," I say. I get absolutely tons of sponsors now.

**[total review count: approx. 14]**

Chapter 5

The bloodbath is here. I'm going to miss Canary. I run for a pack in the forest arena after the countdown ends, and manage to make it safely to the forest. I am safe now, but I am so scared that the boy from 2 might spot me. I then see the shadow of the twelve year old from District 10 who reminds me so much of Prim **(confuse your story with the original within the story)**

"Hi, I'm Kitty," I said. She peeks her head out and looks at me. "I'm from District 12."

"Ra," she introduced herself. "I'm from District 11." **(once again, changing details)**

We go downhill until we find a river.

**[It cuts off here. Total review count: approx. 17]**

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**Secondary A/N: While the above story has been written for the sake of parodying, I have seen stories similar to the above that really did receive around that many reviews while being that poorly written. I will not be naming stories. However, for the sake of honesty, I do not know how many of those reviews were positive. Like most people, I just looked at the review count. **

**A chapter on SYOTs should be coming up next. **


	3. Random OC Games - SYOTs

**Disclaimer: Don't own Hunger Games, as I have stated in the previous chapters. The Hunger Games belong to Suzanne Collins. **

**A/N: Hi everybody. Thank you for all your reviews. There are several ones I want to comment on. **

**RueThisDay: I laughed at your review, mainly because that is the quality of quite a few of the reviews fanfictions like this get. I've had a review before which was exactly zero words long and just an ellipses (at least they did not manage to miss-spell anything so don't see this as a complaint). You are also right. Quite a few bad SYOTs only have three bad chapters, and the other things you said are also true. **

**thebooknerdxoxo: Yup, a cheesy advert voice works. Whenever I write these things I write it with a sarcastic tone which is similar to what you were saying. Have you watched Honest Trailers on YouTube (which, for disclaimer's sake, I don't own in any form or way either)? That's the sort of voice I think of. **

**Everybody else (because it seems unfair not to comment on your reviews when I've done the others individually): Thank you for reviewing. I am glad you enjoyed it. :)**

**For this chapter, I am not saying that ****_all _****SYOTs are bad. It's just that the majority of those that I've read aren't that particularly good. **

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**Random OC Games – SYOTs**

Hmm, sixteen reviews for the last example story? That seems a little small, doesn't it, especially as it has only been done a few thousand times? At this point you will decide that you will write another story which is bound to get more reviews, if only for the reason that the reviewers are commenting on the characters they created (then entered).

does not seem to allow entry via reviews for tributes. That is incredibly lucky, as it is rare that people seem to notice if you break the rules, and, if you are really just going to do it by PM, the people who send you tributes are all members. That is good. That means that you are more likely to get follows and favourites, and the more people that are following your story the more likely they are to read your chapters soon after you update them.

The first step of writing a SYOT _should_ be the tribute form, simply so you know the tributes before you start writing. Hint, I said _should_. But that may also, at that point, be counted as a non-story so add on some very boring part from the perspective of the Head Gamemaker. Or the president. This president can be President Snow (anything up to, presumably, the 250th Games can work that way, because apparently Snow is un-kill-able and does not die of old age). Or just create some very obvious replacement.

Okay, so we have a small short, 100 word chapter either from the perspective of President Ice or Head Gamemaker Heneca Krane. Even if it is not a Quarter Quell (actually, it does not matter which year you are doing, _always _promise some special twist), claim that this year is going to be fantastic and special for no real reason at all. It goes something like this:

_Heneca Krane's POV:_

_I walked into the room President Ice was waiting in. He was strocking __**(hint, the points on spelling mistakes in the previous chapter still apply) **__his white beard and cutting his roses. _

_"Is the arena ready?" president ice __**(forget to capitalize names)**__ asked. I panick, because of course I still need crucial points like mutts and whatever. __**(Gamemakers in their thirties **_**obviously**_** have the same thought patterns and attitude to work as some teenagers)**_

_"Yes. Would you like to see?" I asked. I handed him blueprints of the arena which he put in the holographic projector __**(don't ask, okay; just forget what blueprints are and this will work). **__He lookt at what I designed. _

_"Ah, this is great," President Ice said. I __**(sure, why not, miss out words) **__relieved. "The tributes won't know what hit them. Have you got ideas for the mutts?"_

_"I am working on it, sir," I said. I left the room feeling knowing that the tributes will not know what hit them. __**(repeat yourself as well, and pretend that an ending like that sounds menacing)**_

After that, because clearly you are also not inventive when it comes to coming up with mutts, you ask the reader about which mutts they want to see. Label that the introduction, and ta-da, you no longer need to write anything except rules to the SYOT for several chapters. Now it counts as a story (for some reason).

Usually, on the same day, update the next chapter with an empty tribute list. That is very easy to do. Just start with D1 for District 1 and work your way down to D12, unless you feel like adding D13 or D14. Yes, that's right, some people add District 14 for some reason, and that district's most common use is medicine.

Under each of those headings you can either write G (girl) and B (boy), or F (female) and M (male) for the tributes of different genders. Don't bother writing out the full words like I have done in brackets; everybody knows what you are talking about. On the bottom of that page, or if you want it could also be on the next page, you have a tribute entry form, which contains a bunch of details you need and will never use (personality, family history, etc.) and things which are never ever mentioned in the average fic but still asked for (height in feet and inches, weight in pounds, etc.). While some of those things might be needed, like telling the difference between a massive and a tall tribute, for some reason simply descriptive words are not allowed in the entry form.

If you feel too lazy to put up a full form like that - as many of those forms include things like interview outfits, and quotes, and whether they are open to romances, and alliances and how they act at the Cornucopia/final eight/preferred death/whatever - don't worry about it. Just do a simple form, and the rest of the details you can invent. This is step one of creating identical tributes no matter what people say about their personalities, as _surely _the tributes will react in similar ways and of course because originality is bad.

Here we might have a simple form:

_Name:  
Age (12-18):  
Gender (M/F):  
District (top 3 choices):  
Appearance (at least 2 sentences):  
Personality (at least 3 points):  
Strengths (up to 3):  
Weaknesses (at least 2):  
History (at least three sentences):  
Volunteered/Reaped:  
Reason/Reaction:  
Allies?:  
Romance?:  
Preferred death:  
Anything else?:_

There we have a very simple form. As you can see, we have skipped out things like district token and detailed information on the physical appearance of the tribute. It's a very run-of-the-mill form. Most people add things like how they are dressed, and if you want to be very lazy you can ask the people entering to come up with the prep team and stylists as well.

Most of these forms finish with 'preferred death'. If you want to be truly typical, write a disclaimer after that reminding the people entering the tributes that the chances are that their tributes are going to die. The last point, 'anything else', refers to the part of the form where you became tired of thinking of questions, so again that part is up to the person entering the tribute to come up with. I've added in the point of romance, because _of course_ you want a romance. Who doesn't?

Most tribute forms have the same general things in them so it makes it really hard to go wrong. Simply copy-and-paste somebody else's tribute form and add or subtract a field to prevent them noticing. Try to avoid spelling mistakes on your tribute forms. As you are only putting five words maximum together, that _should _be easy enough to do, and you must pretend that you have already not done a typically bad introduction chapter.

Now, wait for a few weeks or months. Start taking whichever tributes people offer, because you aren't getting enough. Don't worry. You're still getting as many or more reviews than the average good story, because people will review to say that they are sending tributes. As reviews are usually the only way for guests to submit tributes, rules or not you will get some submissions by review as well.

Don't want to keep people waiting? As soon as you get a district pairing together, write their Reaping. Follow up, in random order, the Reapings of the other districts. Make them as identical as possible. It really doesn't matter which order they are in or even whether the characters fit the personalities the people sending the tributes in were going for.

Here's an example Reaping: See how many of the details in the first set of bold brackets you can find evidence of.

_D1 Girl – Sparkle Sparklington _**(age: 16; appearance: blonde, brown eyes, tall, long hair; personality traits: bubbly, humble, excited)**

_I am so excited for volunteering, because I am way brilliant __**(humble went out of the window quickly, and that is not good grammar) **__at dozens off __**(that's right, more spelling mistakes) **__weapons. I am really excited. And I am going to win, then I will live in a massive house in victor's village __**(that's a name, it should be capitalized... nah, everybody knows it's bad by now - commentator out)**__. That will be fantastic. _

_I can use the mace and the spear and the bow and arrws. Me and my friends are all talking near the reaping square. They no I am going to volunteer, so are so happy for me. They sink it will be great to have a victor friends. _

_The escort calls the name of the female tribute. I am ready. "I volunteer as tribute. I am Sparkle Sparklington." _

_D1 Boy – Marvellous Fantasticness _**(age: 18; appearance: brown spiky hair, blue eyes, tall, muscular, fantastic looking; personality traits: cocky, brilliant, cold)**

_I am so excited for volunteering, because I am am clearly going to win. This girl called Sparkle volunteered. I'm going to beat her, easily. That will be so easy. She's so stupid if she tinks she can win against me. _

_"I volunteer as tribute," I announced. "Marvellous Fantasticness." _

Hmm, yup. Those are very different and well defined characters, I see. Write one of those for each of the tributes, when you've got them all. Finally, once all the Reapings are finished, you can start writing the goodbye scenes (or skip over them, nobody cares), the train scenes (might as well skip over them as well) and the training scenes. You have two options. Either you depict every moment for all the tributes so you will never get around to writing the arena, or you can just give them training scores and skip right to the arena. Those are the _only_ two options.

Keep swapping perspectives at strange times, of course. Skip in the middle of conversations, go to random characters that you know are going to die in the bloodbath, etc. If you want, you can claim that you are going to pick names of the tributes killed out of a hat for the bloodbath, but that does not seem very logical. Especially if you claim that some characters are bad at tactics. There is only so far irrational luck can get tributes. What if you lose all the Careers in the bloodbath?

Your method of killing tributes is clearly rigged but apparently random. Okay, enough said on that. You can claim your way of killed off tributes, but you don't really have to do it that way. You are doing this over the internet. Those people aren't spying on you all the time so they won't know the difference.

Of course, most of the fanfics don't even make it to the bloodbath. You are still getting readers because the people who entered are following 'their own' tributes, so you've almost trapped yourself some readers. Perfect. And that, folks, is why SYOTs get so many reviews. It does not really matter how well you write it.

Some things still apply from the 74th Hunger Games rip-offs. _Of course_ the arena is a forest. There is no need for originality. What have I already told you about originality? It scares away reviewers, because people want to read things they've read hundreds of times. Remember, the similarities between the tributes will not get any less at this point. The readers will most likely be confused and forget which tributes come from which district because there are so many of them without any real differences in character. Hmm, maybe they'll review, because once again _no one _checks the quality of reviews before reading.

The final point of getting more reviewers stuck with your story is this thing known as sponsorship points. Every action gets you a certain amount of points (e.g. submitting a tribute: 100 points; reviews: 25 points each) and you can spend it on items for your tribute (e.g. a meal may cost 50 points). When you start giving people points, they have to keep reading your story in order to use them on your tributes. Plus, it's a good way to scam people into reviewing.

Perfect.

Warning: Doing sponsorship might mean added work to keep track of the amount of points people have. Don't worry about this now. It fails in so many fics that you can just say you tried, and give up if you really cannot be bothered. The chances are you are not going to get to the arena anyway. _Perfect._

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**I'm not quite sure which cliché I will do next (there are tons to choose from). Either way, I will update soon. Please leave reviews. :)**


	4. Other Tribute's Perspective

**Disclaimer: The Hunger Games belongs to Suzanne Collins. The inspiration of this fic is credited to some really clichéd fanfiction stories and writers who write stories based on the original book by Suzanne Collins. **

**Hi everybody. Sorry for the sort of shorter chapter, but I am busy with other things at the moment and wanted to give you an update. Thank you for all of your reviews, favourites and follows; and for your suggestions. I am trying to do the guide in a logical order where the points sort of lead to one another, but I intend to eventually get all of those and others done. **

**RueThisDay: Go on then, mickey-take fanfiction :). It would be great to see your take on it, and those are always funny. **

**Kojishin: If you end up writing a SYOT, I will probably read it and leave a review. You should give it a go. Use this guide accordingly (but it's your choice what 'accordingly' is) XD. **

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**Other Tribute's Perspective **

Phew, those previous chapters were hard, weren't they? You'd have to (_gasp_) create your own 'original' arena, filled with 'original' plot twists and 'original' characters (let's keep up the pretence). For this part of the guide you will not even have to pretend to be that creative. Yes, that's right, this is the 74th Hunger Games from other tributes' perspectives.

There are some common tributes you can use. Cato and Clove (but never just one of them) are some of the most common, but that goes into the realms of Clato and so shall be covered in the next chapter. Glimmer, again, is a common one. As is Foxface. With that last one, don't worry, you no longer have to come up with a name for her. Caesar _probably _called her Finch in the Hunger Games movie; therefore that is what you shall call her. Or name her after her actress. Before anybody knew about that, her name was a variation of 'Fox' in almost all fanfics. All is good. Then there are also the District 11 tributes. Rue, of course, is popular. Thresh isn't as much, but he will show up in your Rue fanfics.

Basically, every named tribute would work. Or go for the unnamed ones. It does not matter. The only thing they must all have in common is that they follow either Katniss or the Careers around (mainly Katniss). This might, of course, be the reason for the relative lack of Thresh-centric fics. Wait, what am I saying '_might_'?

This is a typical concept:

_Willow is the girl from District 7 _**(if you remember correctly from the guide to Panemy names, all District 7 tributes must be named after trees - it does not matter than neither Johanna nor Blight seem to be in the original). **_She gets reaped for the 74__th__ Hunger Games. Follow her as she fights for her survival. Will she win? _**(well, ****_no, _****because you claim in the next sentence that you're remaining 'true to the books') **_True to the books. _

That's ridiculous. Don't worry, you can stop being true to the books after twenty seconds once you remember that the girl from District 7 dies in the bloodbath. Then suddenly it is not true to the books anymore. Then you probably decide to remove that final sentence from the introduction.

And throw in a romance. _Everybody _in the 74th Hunger Games is in a romance at one point or another. Hmm, Willow is obviously 16 like all the tributes whose ages have not been given are (conveniently ignore the fact that the ages were given in the movie). Give her a good romance with her district partner… and suddenly both of the tributes from District 7 have to survive the bloodbath.

Or make it Cato/OC. That's a common one. So here we have Willow, previously this random boring unnamed character, who might be in love with Cato and her unnamed district partner. Love triangle. But do it so badly that despite it explicitly being stated, nobody notices that it is going on. Every story needs its 'not-love triangle'.

Or make her hate Cato. It's even better if you have a mini-Katniss. As soon as she gets into the arena, she must follow Katniss everywhere. The scenes remain pretty much the same as those in the books from this point on.

Here's an example scene. I have chosen the tracker jacker scene as it is a common one.

_Oh no, the careers are aproaching _**(I think you get the spelling mistakes and changes of tense by now; I will stop pointing it out)**_. I scamperd behind the rocks. Luckily they have not spotted me. They find Katniss who is sitting in hee water. She runs. They run after her. I run after them _**(logical reasons aren't necessary)**_. My body hurt from the fire, as it almost gets me _**(forgotten full stop)**

_Katniss is a good climber. Not as good as rue, whos also up there. I saw her jump from branch to branch before._

_'How are you doing down there?" Katniss calls _**(don't bother having the book at hand; just paraphrase the actual lines)**_._

_"Not bad, you?" one of the Careers said. _

_"A bit hot for my liking. It's better up here. Why don't you come on up?" Katniss replied. I smile. Good, she'll get away. They are clearly too big for branches. Oh look, there appeers to be a tracker jacker nest. _**(also, events are skipped)**

_Cato climbs, and falls. Glimmer climb, then climbs down. Really, is Katniss not spotting that nest? _**(obviously things are apparent to your main character who cannot logically see that far to a great accuracy)**

_They set up camp, because Peeta Lover Boy says so. I wait for them. Rue pointed out the tracker jacker nest, finally. I wait. If I move they will see me or sumthing. I fall asleep. _**(don't vary the sentence structure too much)**

_I wake up to screaming. Oh no, she has finally done that thing with the tracker jackers I know about. I run, but they sting me. I scream. But thats alright as I get far enough away notto be sptted by them. _

At this point it would be more logical to make the random tribute from whichever tribute you have chosen a ghost after being killed in the bloodbath, who follows around Katniss for some reason. Okay, that is not logical. But I said _more logical_, not _logical_. Don't do that one though. It's not cliché enough.

Ah, isn't it great to have this Mary Sue main character who can follow all of your favourite characters of the Hunger Games? The only better thing might be to actually use the original characters. Enter Foxface, Rue, Glimmer, etc.

With the exception of Rue, you might notice that none of the other characters don't really have any lines. How convenient. Write them however you want. Nobody can claim that they are OOC because they don't have lines.

So start them off in their district. Like outlined in the previous chapters, go through the different stages like the Reapings, the train, the opening ceremonies and training. It is not necessary to give many details about the district; just start them off at the square.

Family and friends, again, close enough the same. In Rue's case, refer to her sisters as Suzanne Collins has mentioned them already, which therefore does not involve creativity. The only real thing that is different is that you get to follow Katniss everywhere. You know, pretty much exactly like you do in the actual original book from her perspective. Rue, of course, follows Katniss around. It's not like the fire brought them together (although that probably was actually the reason judging by Rue's burns). Obviously Rue was following Katniss.

And Foxface follows the other tributes for food anyway. For the typical, review-worthy, cliché-filled fanfiction, you really don't have to do much more. I cannot emphasize that enough.

In this case, there are actually many people who would like the story to follow canon. Read the reviews. See if the readers want Foxface/Rue/whoever to survive. You can always stop following the books. Make their death scene no fault of their own, as commonly the characters you write about are near perfection. Maybe make Foxface's death a suicide as she does not want to kill anybody (it's only been done around fifty times... and it can be seen as noble). Or make Rue incredibly noble as she went looking for Katniss, therefore not leaving her at fault for being on the ground. The possibilities are limitless, but of course use the first thing you can come up with as that is usually the most obvious and best reason.

Disclaimer: Due to there being no method included to scam people into reviewing, and in this case no additional romance (I hinted at Cato/OC, but that is such a cliché that it needs a whole chapter of its own), you will not get as many reviews. However, there will be people interested in the 74th Hunger Games, so you will get enough. Perfect.

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**I think I shall be writing a chapter for Clato next. Time to parody that typical fanfiction romance, don't you think? :)**


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